A neglected copper mine

This really looks unimpressive, but I swear its just a bad photo. Forgive the light quality, and trust me- this is actually very cool. React with oohs and ahhs accordingly.

So, as most readers of this site know by now, I currently going through a sort of scrap metal/capitalistic recycling phase right now. I dismantle and destroy things to sell their metal for money- especially copper and aluminum.

With this in mind, I have been trolling the nh.craigslist.com free ads for anything that might be fun and profitable. A while ago, I posted a listing in the "Wanted" section saying that I would pick up dead or dying UPS (Uninteruptable power supply systems... those things that power your computer and stuff when the power goes out). I advertised "dead battery, bad battery or no battery" because all I want from them is the copper in their large transformers. Maybe two or three pounds. A week went by, and all I got was someone asking $20 for a perfectly working unit. "I'm sorry, but thats not how we play this game" (I know only two people perhaps who read this will get the Paul Shanklin reference, but that's OK.)

Meanwhile, I answered a listing from someone who said they had a few monitors they wanted to get rid of. It was a phone number only listing. I called.

"Ages and stages?" The person said on the other line.

I was a bit confused, but I had the right number... Turns out, they asked for donated computer equipment for their preschool and they got more then they bargained for. Everyone dumped their computers on them. They kept the best and it looked like someone took most of the actual systems- but they had about 15 monitors left over. Most of them, as she told me were "still working as far as I can tell". I told her I'd take them all and that I'd call back shortly to arrange a pickup.

Meanwhile, sometime around the next day, someone finally answered my listing for old UPS systems:

"I have one ups system that I'm just waiting for the word to remove it. I think it was made in 1990 but I am not sure. It is BIG so you will need a pick up truck. Is this something you want?"

He said he was located around Exeter, which was a bit far for me but I conversed with him for a bit through email and he sent me some pictures of the beast that made me feel it was a reasonable risk to take. Plus, it wasn't very far from the monitors so I'd be combining the trips. I felt pretty good about it so I told him I'd pick up the unit and asked for the address and when I could pick it up. He wrote back:

"Hours of pick up are 08:00 to 14:00 ... My name is Sgt. Dave ..."

At this point my eyebrows were raised. Was this some military base I would be going to? I felt a bit nervous. I read on:

"...Upon your arrival you will need to call me a 2nd time so I can let security know. You will be going to a corrections center so NO firearms!!!"

A corrections facility? Wait isn't that like... *gulp* a prison??

Yup. Sure was.

Somehow I roped my good friend Jim into going with me. So here we are- two guys, driving up in a van loaded down with 15 computer monitors into a prison facility (complete with barbed wire fences stretching to the heavens), sitting in the parking lot by the sheriff's cars, suspiciously rocking the van back and forth, trying to get a cell signal to call the good Sargent out.

But it all turned out all right. In the end we made contact with him and he walked us to the loading dock (a secure facility mind you) whilst once making a joke about "not getting shot at". Which was great. Because even though we were honestly a bit concerned, having a guy be able to joke about it is fun. Anyways, if I did exit this life then, I would have wanted it to be while laughing. Sargent Dave was cool.

The Sargent called two guys from the maintenence team and together all four of us hoisted the big sucker into the van. It was ridiculously bottom heavy. Even with out the batteries.

Yeah, the batteries were gone. Luckily that wasn't our main focus anyway: Our main focus was the copper in the transformers. And... well, I'll let you decide:

This is a little more then half of the second smallest transformer windings. Yup, that is some fat PHAT copper wire of epic proportions. No, the picture doesn't do it justice. You have to examine this thing for yourself and feel the weight. Plus the low light conditions couldn't have helped.. This is the one Jim Sawed away at for about 40 minutes. The matching half to this- which is a bit smaller- is worth by itself 10 dollars. With that one transformer, we broke even. It will pay the gas money and then some. All together: Over 65 pounds of copper, as told by the bathroom scale in this picture:


I like this last picture; for some reason the copper stacked up like that makes me think of something out of a Doctor Who episode.

So... 65 pounds of copper times $2 per pound. I got $120 greenbacks in just copper, not counting the aluminum and wire (which I will also sale).

In the first picture, you'll notice behind the block of copper a big aluminum heat sink with several devices attached to it. These have copper inserts for getting rid of the heat. Copper then aluminum, smeared together with thermal paste. Whatever these were, they must have ran pretty hot. I was looking at the copper with a greedy eye. My dad stopped me.

"Before you cut into that thing for copper, let me look up the part number".

I shrugged and told him to go ahead. Dad was great. He kept coming in when our dismantling of doom was at full fury and impart small words of wisdom. He would say something like "This transformer here looks like the top has just been tack welded on... I'm willing to bet that if you could cut through that, the rest would chisel right off." Then he'd leave. And sure enough, it would be as he said and save us untold hours. Jim, who did basically did all the copper removal work (thanks Jim!) got really fast after using this method. He then used the blocks he removed as stands to elevate the transformer up as he pounded the copper out. He got pretty fast at it. The last few went by in probably less then 10 minutes a transformer- quite a feat.

Later my dad came down with the spec sheet for the chips he looked up.

"Guess how much each of those is worth."

"Five dollars?" I guessed.

"Twenty?" Jim chimed in.

"If you wanted to buy them online right now, they would cost you 320 bucks a pop."

So yeah... there were about 4 or 5 of those on one side. I doubt we can get that much for them, but they should be worth a bit more then their scrap value, thats for sure. I just have to get someone to buy 'em now.

Okay, lets see. I've told these stories so often I've gotten bored of them, heh... But. I didn't mention the 15 monitors. I got to utilize my handy dandy trusty wusty (sorry) Pocket PC:

I was pretty proud of this. It was raining very hard last Saturday, so I backed the van into the garage and threw a computer in the back and set it up as a test box. I then started taking the monitors and testing them one by one. I'd put a piece of tape on it, give it a number, then hook it up and see how high a resolutioun it would take, what size it was and how high the brightness and contrast had to be turned up to order to look good. I put in all this info in on the fly with my pocket PC. I felt very geekish. Thank you so very much Pip. This thing rocks.

Oh, and you have NO idea how hard it was to get that picture of the Pocket PC clear. I must have taken ten pictures of that thing. I'm almost more proud of that picture then I am of the whole copper thing. I'm not going to show you the monitors; you all should know what they look like and the shots were really low-light, ghetto quality anyway.

So I have 6 monitors left. If you want one, come and get it. I'm open to trade, cash or begging. I'm trying to sell them but monitors are a dime a dozen these days. Except for the 19 inch, $10 a piece is probably all I'll get for them. Which is fine.

All in all, this was a pretty encouraging Saturday for me, and I think for Jim too, who is also getting into the spirit of capitalistic recyling (busy though he be). This was certainly a high yield. Its funny; all this momentum in the scrapping business and I'm about to start a full time job. But I'm going to keep at the scrapping stuff. Its just to much fun. And I think there's a good business to be built around this.

"Whats that, Zeke? A full time job??" Yeah. I'll post about it later. Quite crazy, actually. Until then, have some more pictures.

Jim and Dad confer over a big HOG transformer that has just had its lid removed.

(Click to see full size and read text)
Imagine seeing the whole world like this; little mental price tags on everything. That's pretty much where I am right now... Twisted, I know.

Small disappointments

Well, my last entry or two have been all about happyish things. So I figured I'd pop the collective cheerful outlook balloon now, and metaphorically rain on any parades that might be passing. Ladies and gents, with out further ado- a list of things I am disappointed in.

First, lets deal with things close to home. I am disappointed, not only with myself but in all of you for not realizing for over a stinking YEAR that I spelled "Reepicheep" incorrectly with as "Repicheep".

A) To say I am a Narnia fan is an understatement close in kin to saying that "the Beatles were stars" or "Being dipped in hot oil stings a little". So I should know these things. Furthermore, Reepicheep is one of my favorite characters in all the series if not THE favorite character. How could I do this to such an honerable beast?
B) I am literate for crying out loud!

In my defense (for what its worth) my first instinct was to go for "Reepicheep". But something gave me pause, and I SWEAR I rememer looking it up somewhere online and thought that I was wrong, and therefore thought I was correct in spelling it "Repicheep".

And now I have had this name for about a year or more on blogger. Flash forward to about a week ago- I went to a surprise party for Jim (which, I must say , pWnd! Props to you, Steph. and fam for pulling it off). The person's house who hosted the party also had FIOS (which is an amazing high speed internet running on fiber all the way to the house, but thats a topic too happy for this post). So to try it out, and for a little shameless self-promotion, I go to this very website. Right away Steph says "Thats great, but you've spelled Reepicheep wrong". To which I get all defensive and say "no no no, I thought so too but look it up" and I triumphantly bring up wikipedia....and fall flat on my proverbial face.

So that was rant number 1. Its fixed now, but I can't believe I went so long with out knowing my error and I am saddened at heart to know that no one else corrected me.

While I am still complaining about this community, it also saddens me that no one got the obvious coded message in the previous post. What do you all have, lives or something?

Thats actually about all I can manage to be dismal about. I'll tell you one thing I am NOT dismal about right now: GreenDragonRider's upcoming story about What happened to Susan. I am so excited about this project you have no idea. Everyone go over there and show her love in the comments so she gets encouragement and all that stuff.

Oh, and here are the only two photo's from the computer smashing party that wasn't:

Shinyish pile of metal and wire on the end of the table closest to camera is copper. Its a bad picture; I know. You see it was stuck on Black and white and I couldn't fix it, and on top of that the memory card filled up after I took two pictures. Bummer.

From left to right: Mr. Sledgehammer, partly concealed by Mr. Dead and Dying Monitor Tube. Far right and off picture: Mister and Misses Plastic monitor shell and their two kids.

"Who are you guys?" and more scrap stories

The last post really seemed to bring some readers out of the woodwork. Thank you all for reading, I appreciate it oodles! But- who are you guys? I think I've identified most of you by now through tedious deduction and case files, but there are a few of you whom I have only cold leads. I would never demand a full name from anyone, but if you could give me a name- even if its a first name, a fake name that sounds like your name, an inside joke- anything! I'd be a much happier person.

Not to say that I am not a happy person normally. I must say; as of late God has been spinning my story in positive ways I could not have imagined. Even reading Book the 13th in A Series Of Unfortunate Events didn't bring me down more then it intrigued me. In fact, in honor of this fact, I was seriously contemplating doing this post entireyly in the Sebald code. But that woold take to long, and there are probably better means for such ends as a codud messages.

So I had an awesome idea: I would make going through computer scrap into a party. A computer and other electronics destruction party- or CAOEHDP, I suppose. Anyway, I figured afficiency would go up since we could invent a sort of disassembly line, and I figured it would be a lot of fun, because, come on- who wouldn't vant to tear apart and smash computers with heavy tools? The idea of putting a sledegehammer through a screen alone has had strange effects on all my friends. I can understtand it.

I had this idea floating around my head for awhile, and I wanted to get moving on it before the snow ruined everything. Soo after I got the idea cleared with the parents, I sent out an email to my geek friends and told others that I forgot wherever I could. But I only gave them 2 days notice. Yeah, I don't kmow what I was thinking.

Anyway, some people wunted an update and wanted pictucres. Basically, I had a fun time, but it was just me and Anders. For awhile. Then we picked up N and that was fun too, but we only went through 3 monitors and a scanner.

On the way back home after picking up Noah, we passed the American legion building. Outside was a sign that said "Free yard sale". I had never heard of such a thing, but instantly I knew it was for me. I pulled into the nearest place I coulhd do a U-turn and checked it out. Apparently they decided that since thteir yard sale fundraising thing was over, everyone could just take what they wanted for free. Being in a scrap mood, I looked around. I saw a table saw. It would have been to heavy for me to get in the van probably. I saw a miicrowave. I took it. Microwaves are high in copper and low in fat. This one especially, because it was ventilmated which means there is a deceent size motor spinning the fans. w00t! While looading it I met a guy who has been in the scrap businness for 17 years. He was a colorful fellow full of merriment and boisterous swearing. He had seen this place and pulled in, but he had onlyy his car with him and so could take only smaller things. He did have his trusty crow bar with him, so he toook what he could. What he could was the cast aluminum in a propane grill. "Here, do you want the rest of this f___n grill? I'd take it myself man, but I've dun't have the f___n truck. But there's some aluminum here, this might be steel but it could be aluminum, got some wire here for the igniter- the fittings are all f___n brass. Here, take it!" It was a genrerous gift. I threw it in the back, too.

I carried in the microwave like a slain beast I brought to a facilhitate a table of plenty. I dropped it on the ground dramataically.

"What have you got there?" my dad asked, and I told him.
"Wait wait wait- before you take an axe to that thning see if it works."

The thing had no proper cord- just three wires coming out. It was apparently the type you install in your kitchen. I didn't think it would work, but I shrugged. Why not? I pulled the power cord out from a monitor and plugged the wires into it. The unit's clock came on.

Well, so far so good. After fiddling around with the menu, we got it to try and cook. The light turned on and it sounded like it was running. "How can we be sure?" someone asked. "Get some water" my dad said, "Get some popcorn!" others chimed in. I ran into the housse and grabbed some grapes. We threw them into the nuke and turned it on. They sparked and popped- it worked! We later proved that the motors worked too. This is all cool, but we don't need another microwave. And even though its outside dimensions are bigger, its pretty small inside. Does anyone out there want a microwave? If so then thats cool, I have an extra. But otherwise its going down. To much copper to just have it sit there, all intact like but not doing anything.

Oh- one more thing. Remember the table saw I saw? Well I planned on telling my dad about it to see if we should go get it later. But I forgot. Sunday I remembered, I think during our youth group thing- we all went to Macks Apples and made pies from picking to baking. It was a lot of fun. But on the way back home, dad asked me where I saw the table saw. We pulled in, and sure enough, it was still there. We decided to take the sucker home. That was a challenge. That sucker is HEAVY. Once we finally got it in the house though, we surveyed what we had found. On one hand, their is probably 70 pounds of steel on that thing and a good deal of copper in the massive motor, so if it didn't work, its no problem. But having a working table saw would be awesome. While plugging it in, we discovered the cable was badly damaged. We plugged it in and- nothing. After looking all over for the switch, we found it. The machine roared to a life. Dad and I started laughing the almost evil type of laugh when you get something very good that by all accounts you shouldn't have got. I turned the device off and quickly fetched a face shield and a scrap two by four. I spun the beast up once more and fed the board through. It cut like butter.

I'm pretty psyched about it. The blade is even in good condition! Soon, I hope to buy a cut-off blade to cut through the iron surrounding the copper wire in the transformers. Should make the work a lot easier.

Thanks for reading- and those of you who comment, remember to tell me who you are! :D

Free flowing mind patty melt

Hi everyone.

First of all, I'm so happy (blessed?) to have a few cool friends care about if I post or don't. The truth is, I just haven't been in the mood to blog recently. On the one hand, I really wanted to have a nice big and really good piece for the next post. But on the other hand, like Kiaya said, it doesn't have to be profound. But you see I was (am) on the verge of such a great topic. I am on the verge of a potentially major-life-style-changing sort of post, and so I wanted to see if that pans out. I'll probably know in a week or two. Then I'll really have a post. Or not. We'll see.

But as for this one, I think I'll just do a rambling/stream of conscious cop out. Forgive me, for I have no creativity and am slightly cranky right now. Here goes:

I had ALOT of fun at the hike. What can I say, I just LOVE the crazy cool ilk that Agape seems to attract. I had some great conversation and alot of fun times.

Some times in the past, things I'd see around me would lower my hope for humanity and dreams I'd see inside of me would raise them. Now, things I see in people around me raise my hopes and respect for humanity, and things I see within myself lower them. I don't know exactly how to take it. Its not a witty nugget of wisdom; its just a reflection.

Salvation- once saved, always saved vs. Worked out by faith debate. Ageless, endless and yet ever so pressing. This topic came up at the dinner table strangely enough, and I avoided answering for awhile, mainly because I disagreed with myself. By my sense of justice, I would say that certain people shouldn't be forgiven, or that at least, if they were forgiven and then got worse later the grace that was extended to them would seem to be void. For example, I can grasp God ransoming someone who killed others, I can understand that person being reformed and forgiven (Like Paul), but someone being ransomed by God and then going out and killing, I just sort of have this kneejerk gut reaction against them being still "saved". Not that my instincts make it right.

Perhaps it makes sense to think of the free gift of salvation as not a one time use gift- maybe something like a beverage. Maybe an antidote; yes that works. So if you accept this antidote for a year or two for free, you're great. But you can take the gift and then not use it for awhile, at point your in trouble. In this way of looking at it, it is simply a matter of USING the free gift.

I know, there were zilch scripture references in that, which I suppose makes it a large bunch of pointless speculation. Very well, treat it as such. I really am just wondering things out loud.

Uhh, what else.... I have discovered some music recently that I really don't like. That, no matter how much I try to find the cool artistic intent behind it, I can't think of anything good to say. Yes, it was on the radio.

Cliche ahead warning: When God shuts a door, he really does open another. Its almost like he's trying to lead me somewhere (Mock sarcasm: NO! rEEALY?). But its true. The Agape thing (disclaimer: even though basically my fault) really broke me for a bit, but I bounced back from it for the better. I hope that all can do the same. Its ironically enough gotten me on a better path for finishing up my education and POSSIBLY even- oh right, that I was going to save for later if it panned out.

Uhh... Speaking of pans. Bed pans make me think of oil pans, or actually vice versa.

I think we should turn some of our frickin huge amounts of coal into artificial Gasoline and stick it to our enemies over in good ol' midEa. Having your enema hold the purse strings to your economy is basically stupid. If you allow major opportunities to regain control of the purse strings, possibly even treasonous.

I do believe in Bigelow- I do, I DO!

Is

Update:I just posted this by accident. I think it was a sign. I am tired, I am through. I am tired, how bout you?

You want a post, wise guy?

Zeke is not dead.

---Someone who should know

P.S.: More at eleven*.


*does not guarantee or designate actual time.